Lockerbie orphan laid to rest

Stephen Flannigan was buried in Dryfesdale cemetary

Tributes have been paid to the man orphaned in the Lockerbie disaster who died on his 26th birthday, two days after being hit by a train.

More than 200 mourners gathered at the Holy Trinity Church in Lockerbie for the Requiem Mass of Stephen Flannigan.

During the service his uncle, Lawrence Doolan, spoke of Mr Flannigan's life since Pan Am flight 103 crashed at Lockerbie killing his parents Tom and Kathleen and his sister Joanne.

Mr Doolan told the service: "In the natural cycle of events grandparents and parents are expected to die before their children.

"That didn't happen in Stephen's case and he was on his own wheel of fire after 1988.

Mr Flannigan at his sister's funeral

"But everything turned full circle, chaotically, when he died so suddenly and unexpectedly under the wheels of a train."

Mr Flannigan was hit by a works train near his home in the village of Heywood, near Westbury, Wiltshire, and died in hospital two days later on 20 August.

He had just returned to Wiltshire after attending the third birthday party of his son Luke, in Scotland.

Mr Flannigan escaped the Lockerbie disaster because he was elsewhere in the town at the time.

He endured further tragedy when his elder brother David died five years later in Thailand and later moved to Wiltshire to make a new life for himself.

Mourners paid tribute to Mr Flannigan

John Boyce, Mr Flannigan's house mate in Wiltshire, said: "It's very unusual to be any place where Stephen is and see so many sad faces.

"He had a wonderfully dry sense of humour and had built a life for himself in a new place and was liked and admired by a wide circle of people."

Father Gerry Donnelly, who conducted the 30-minute service, urged the mourners to heed the Bible story in which Jesus raised his friend Lazarus back to life and told them to keep faith that Mr Flannigan was now in the hands of God.

The congregation heard readings from the Acts of the Apostles and St John's Gospel before Mr Flannigan's coffin was taken from the church to the sound of Led Zepplin's Stairway To Heaven.

Mourners then made their way to Dryfesdale Cemetery where Mr Flannigan was laid to rest beside his brother and close to the memorial and mass grave which holds many of the people killed in the Lockerbie disaster.